Scott St. Germaine (left), MPC president of operations; Ward Forquer, MPC potash marketing and business development manager; and Chris Gable of MAC, stand in front of equipment used for precision application of potash.

DISTRIBUTION

Forquer, St. Germaine and Gable stand in front of a pile of red potash stored at MAC’s Middleton facility. This potash is not sourced from Michigan, but licensed distributors, such as MAC, hope to be buying product from the Michigan Potash Co. by 2021.

POTASH PURITY

William Harrison, WMU professor of geology, has shared his findings with Theodore Pagano, a potash geologist, engineer and general manager of MPC, regarding the purity of the potash samples taken in the 1980s during the original exploration.

TOP OF THE LINE

After Mosaic gifted Western Michigan University with 78 salt cores from the Borgen Bed in 2008, Harrison helped determine the purity of the samples. “It’s incredibly pure,” he says.

HOLD THE POTASH

The Borgen Bed has not been mined for potash since 2014, when Cargill turned this facility into a salt-only processing plant.

CORE SAMPLES

In 2008, Mosaic gifted Western Michigan University with 78 salt cores that were drilled for original exploration. They are still housed at WMU.

READY TO INVEST

Ted Pagano, MPC general manager, is heading up a project to invest $700 million into a potash extraction and processing facility in Evart, Mich.

UNRIVALED PURITY

Michigan potash (right) is compared to the less pure product that is being imported into the United States. The reservoir in Michigan comes at a critical time as the mine in New Mexico is being depleted, making the U.S. heavily dependent on imports sourced from Canada and Russia.

PROPOSED FACILITY

The construction company Barton Malow is working with the Michigan Potash Co. to develop a facility that will produce, store and distribute potash and salt in Evart. Potash is a common component of fertilizer that helps plants better utilize water.v